PANETTA’S AFGHAN CHALLENGE
Successfully managing the U.S. military withdrawal from Afghanistan is perhaps the most urgent task of Leon Panetta, the new U.S. Defense Secretary. The fundamental issue is how fast U.S. and NATO troops will leave the country and what Afghan conditions and regional structure will emerge in their wake. No matter how effectively U.S. forces implement their strategy and tactics, they cannot win the war alone. The Pentagon needs reliable partners, both in Afghanistan and elsewhere, to leave behind a democratic government able to contain widespread political violence and prevent the reconstruction of terrorist bases and suppress a narcotics-funded insurgency that threatens neighboring countries.
BACKGROUND: Last month, President Barack Obama announced the first major withdrawals of U.S. combat forces from Afghanistan in almost a decade. The Pentagon will remove 10,000 troops from Afghanistan in July and August. Another 20,000 U.S. soldiers will depart by the end of 2012, leaving 60,000 American troops in Afghanistan for the time being. NATO decided last November that foreign troops should remain in Afghanistan through at least 2014.
Panetta has insisted that any withdrawal remain “condition-based,” meaning that its pace and extent will depend on how rapidly U.S. forces can transfer the lead role in fighting the war to the Afghan government. The announced dates for this transition have repeatedly slipped as the Taliban has proven more tenacious, and the Afghan security forces less effective, than expected.
Inside Afghanistan, the problem is that the government and its security forces still experience major difficulties in providing good governance and the rule of the law, promoting economic development and job creation, combating corruption and narcotics trafficking, and protecting Taliban members who attempt to reintegrate peacefully into Afghan society. Despite extensive foreign training programs and other support, moreover, the Afghan National Army and Afghan National Police cannot yet defeat the Taliban insurgents without continued direct U.S. combat assistance.
The death of Osama bin Laden is a new wildcard. There are hopes that his elimination will make it easier for additional Taliban leaders to break with the al-Qaeda extremists, but much depends on Pakistani polices. Will the Pakistani authorities use the opening created by his death to turn against the remaining extremists — or will their anger at the unauthorized U.S raid against the bin Laden compound sway them in another direction?
Another uncertainty is how the sweeping turnover in the senior U.S. national security establishment involved with Afghanistan and Pakistan (Gates, Panetta, Mike Mullen, David Petraeus, Karl Eikenberry, David Rodriguez, etc.) might affect the U.S. strategy and positions there. Although the change might not result in radically different U.S. policies, the new personalities might help improve the troubled ties between U.S., Afghan, and Pakistani officials. Afghan President Hamid Karzai’s relations with General Petraeus and Ambassador Eikenberry with have been particularly troubled.
Looking farther out, the U.S. needs to decide what kind of security relationship to sustain in Afghanistan after 2014. Gates has proposed a jointly operated air base, which could include the stationing of unmanned aerial vehicles (UAVs or drones) and perhaps some manned helicopters and combat planes. A more limited option could include U.S. advisers and contractors to supervise the military aid that will likely continue under any scenario. The precise point along this continuum will depend on the degree of continuing internal conflict and the emerging regional security order. Ideally Afghanistan’s neighbors will play a major role in stabilizing the country, but if they continue to wage a proxy fight for influence on Afghan territory, then a continuing U.S. military presence might help stabilize matters.
IMPLICATIONS: One of Panetta’s most important challenges as he manages the planned drawdown in U.S. forces in Afghanistan is crafting a new regional security structure to fill the vacuum. Although Russia and its Central Asian allies have become very supportive of the NATO-led International Security Assistance Force (ISAF) in Afghanistan, they have shown no interest in sending combat troops into Afghanistan. The Kazakh parliament had to rapidly backtrack after a decision to send a few military personnel on a non-combat mission in Afghanistan provoked widespread public outrage. The Collective Security Treaty Organization (CSTO) has limited its role primarily to interdicting some of the Afghan narcotics being trafficked throughout Eurasia.
The Shanghai Cooperation Organization (SCO), which includes many of Afghanistan’s neighbors as full members or formal observers, is sometimes described as a possible replacement security institution for NATO in the Afghanistan region. Despite acknowledging the need to increase their engagement with that country given the impending NATO military withdrawal, last month’s SCO leadership summit in Astana deferred the Afghanistan government’s application to become a formal SCO observer. Karzai again had to attend the summit as a special guest of the host government.
The existing SCO members still seemed confused over the regional security structure they want to erect as NATO reduces its military presence there. Deepening engagement with the Afghan government would help compensate for the NATO military withdrawal, but China in particular appears reluctant to throw its weight behind Karzai for fear of antagonizing the Taliban, which could retaliate against the PRC’s growing economic interests in Afghanistan. As in Libya and the Sudan, the Chinese seem prepared to work with the Taliban if they would respect the PRC’s growing economic presence in the region and not support Uighur separatism in Xinjiang.
The Pentagon might try to compensate for its declining troop strength in Central Asia by increasing still further its drone strikes in Afghanistan, Pakistan, and perhaps elsewhere. As CIA Director, Panetta became very fond of the drone attacks on al-Qaeda and Taliban insurgents operating along the Afghan-Pakistan border. In fact, Panetta’s deep involvement with counterterrorist operations in Pakistan might result in his becoming the main Washington contact with the Pakistani government, filling the role now played by Admiral Mike Mullen, the retiring Chairman of the U.S. Chiefs of Staff. Panetta has developed extensive operational ties with Pakistan’s influential intelligence leaders as head of the CIA, which conducts its own drone operation in Pakistan independent of the Pentagon.
Yet, Pakistan’s potential collaboration in this endeavor remains problematic. Since 9/11, U.S. officials have sought to constrain Pakistani support for their former Taliban allies in Afghanistan as well as other terrorist groups. At the same time, the Pentagon relies heavily on Pakistani support for the U.S.-led military campaign against al-Qaeda and its Taliban allies, which includes air strikes by unmanned aerial vehicles on targets located on Pakistani territory. The United States also needs Pakistani support to transit military supplied to U.S. troops in Afghanistan and to achieve a favorable regional environment for an eventual peace settlement there. Meanwhile, the U.S. gives Pakistan billions of dollars in direct assistance as well as considerable revenue to Pakistanis involved in the shipping of US military supplies to Afghanistan.
Nonetheless, this May’s Pentagon-led helicopter assault on bin Laden’s compound in Abbottabad in central Pakistan has further antagonized many Pakistanis, though its effects on Pakistani-U.S. military and intelligence cooperation appear unclear. Some Pakistani officials have called for distancing their country from the U.S.-led war on terror, while others have pledged to eliminate the terrorist sanctuaries in the Federally Administered Tribal Areas. Evidence that members of Pakistan’s intelligence establishment continue to support the al-Qaeda-linked Haqqani network fighting U.S. forces in Afghanistan persists. The Pentagon has also prudently increased the flow of supplies through the Northern Distribution Network in anticipation of possible cutbacks in the volume of goods reaching Afghanistan through Pakistan.
CONCLUSIONS: One of Gates’ insights that Panetta would be wise to bear in mind is the U.S. need to sustain and apply robust non-military capabilities to Afghanistan and other intra-state conflicts. In Afghanistan, the Pentagon must collaborate with U.S. civilian agencies as well as foreign partners to design and apply tailored defense, diplomatic, and development strategies. Gates described the war in Afghanistan — where a coalition of almost 50 countries, hundreds of nongovernmental organizations, and some of the world’s most important multilateral institutions like NATO, the United Nations, and the European Union are seeking to establish a prosperous and peaceful nation — as a model for applying “the full range of instruments of national power and international co-operation to protect our vital interests”. The underfunding of U.S. civilian agencies having vital national security missions in Afghanistan, such as the State Department, now risks undermining the successes U.S. forces have achieved in the past year, snatching victory from defeat by preventing the consolidation of the recent battlefield victories.
AUTHOR’S BIO: Richard Weitz is Senior Fellow and Director of the Center for Political-Military Analysis at Hudson Institute. He is the author, among other works, of Kazakhstan and the New International Politics of Eurasia (Central Asia-Caucasus Institute, 2008).
